Leaving Iowa

DIRECTOR’S NOTES

Welcome to the La Grange Area Teen Theater Ensemble’s (LATTE’s) comedy, LEAVING IOWA! I’ve deeply cherished producing and directing such a funny and heartwarming show once more… It was our first, full length play in LATTE, and has a very special place in my heart. It is a tale of the best of what family offers, and the comedy that comes with it! I am proud of the animated warmth and vibrant realness that my cast has embraced and claimed as their own. They are incredible and it has been a gift for me to mentor, encourage, share laugh attacks, and direct them.

LEAVING IOWA speaks to everyone. It is, at its core, about the unstoppable force of family. Their unconditional love. Their unfailing patience. Their dogged determination. Their ability to make the most mundane things “Fascinating”… And how boring vacations, trapped in a car, with kids throwing temper tantrums while parents dragging the kids, (and each other), to the most boring, back roads, tourist traps ever, can make the best family memories.

The cast delighted in the honest, unfiltered, raw emotions of the “family”. They bonded sharing stories of their own family vacation mishaps and triumphs. They remembered how important it was to relish the family time they get to share. And laugh. And love.

The “family” might be in a “pressure cooker” of a car, but the raw, surprisingly, healing magic of the show will draw you in as at its core, LEAVING IOWA is a celebration of life, of comedy, a toast and roast to the All American Family Road Trip… and the ability to laugh at yourself. It’s a tale of redemption about a son who desperately wants to atone for his absence.